1, RUE Louis Majorelle – NANCY 15 –16 FEBRUARY 2020 REOPENING FREE INAUGURAL WEEKEND WWW.NANCY.FR reopening 15 and 16 february 2020 The iconic home of Art Nouveau in Nancy, a total work of artby the architect Henri Sauvage, built for the furniture designer Louis Majorelle, a historic monument, owned by Nancy City Council, Villa Majorelle reopens its doors after several months of restoration. Following major external renovation works, which were revealed to the public during the 2017 Heritage Days, Villa Majorelle’s partial internal renovation will be completed in February 2020. Thanks to the meticulous restoration of the well-known original decoration and furnishings of the reception rooms and bedroom, visitors are now offered the opportunity to journey through time to explore the artist’s family life. With its additional reception areas and guide materials for all cultural groups, Villa Majorelle has been established as an essential, exciting and surprising new venue for exploring the world of Art Nouveau in Nancy. Welcome to the Majorelle family home! contents History .....................................................................................................................................4 – Louis Majorelle: an unusual patron – “A house built by an artist, for an artist” – Banishing academic symmetry – A wide range of talent used for the decoration renoVation ...........................................................................................................................6 – From Villa Jika to Villa Majorelle – House or museum? The aims of the project – The advisory committee – External works 2016–2017 – Interior renovation works: 2019–2020 – Interior renovation works: 2021–2022 – A few key figure tHe visit ................................................................................................................................. 14 – An immersive experience – Welcome to the Majorelle family home! tHe reopening .................................................................................................................. 18 – A major inaugural weekend – Visiting information recognitions .....................................................................................................................20 partners ................................................................................................................................21 ContaCTS ............................................................................................................................... 22 press visuals .................................................................................................................... 23 3 History Louis Majorelle: Louis Majorelle was born in Toul on 3 October 1859. His father, Auguste Majorelle (1825–1879), an unusual patron was fairly successful in the field of Japanese-style furniture decoration (using vernis Martin finishes) and style copying. Louis was considering a career as a painter and studied at the School of Fine Arts in Paris but, after the death of his father, had to return to Nancy to help his mother run the family business, which already employed over twenty workers and was enjoying favourable financial success following the annexation of Alsace-Moselle. Under Louis’ leadership, the company launched into the production of modern furniture, in- fluenced by nature and by Emile Gallé: it was an immediate success. At the same time, he conti- nued with the industrial production of style copies. With the help of his brother, Jules Majorelle, the company set out to conquer the Parisian and international markets. In 1904, they opened a retail store on Rue de Provence, Paris (Samuel Bing’s former store) and branches were set up in London, Berlin, Lyon, Lille and even Oran. The sales catalogues offered various products and attested to the longevity of certain models over the decades. Orders from haute couture houses, Parisian cafés, rich industrialists, department stores and embassies made sure that the company enjoyed lasting success and recognition. a House built by In 1898, Louis Majorelle gave the architect Henri Sauvage (1873–1932), who he had met at the home an arTIST, for an arTIST of their mutual friend, the sculptor Alexandre Charpentier, the task of drawing up plans for his personal home in Nancy. Aged just 26, Henri Sau- vage had not yet been involved in such a project; his only experience was a few months of working with the Brussels architect Paul Saintenoy. Nevertheless, Majorelle preferred him to the Nancy architect Lucien Weissenburger, who had just built his workshops and been given the job of carrying on the project. His choice was based partly on the Parisian architect’s creative boldness and partly on the network of artists who would be called upon to take part in the project. It was also an opportunity for Majorelle to show Nancy some original conceptual ideas. Villa Majorelle -or Villa Jika, named using the initials of Louis Majorelle’s wife, Jane Kretz- was built in 1901–1902 and has a very special place in the history of Nancy’s architecture. It was the first completely Art Nouveau house in Nancy, designed as an ensemble in which each compo- nent of its structure and decoration was designed in close interdependence with the rest of the building. The flowing forms and decorative motifs and the continuous interplay between the exterior and the interior make Villa Majorelle an example of success fully applying the notion of artistic unity, advocated by a large number of artists of the period. 4 banisHing The house that Louis Majorelle wanted had to re- flect the spirit that reigned throughout his work: acadeMIC SYMMetry modernity, dynamism and unostentatious simpli- city. Of a reasonable size, it was designed first and foremost for the people who lived in it and their day-to-day comfort. Sauvage thought about living space before elevation, interior layout before academic ideals: the result was described by Franz Jourdain as a “charming, spiritual vision” in the long article that he dedicated to the building in Art et Décoration in 1902. “The eye follows the rise of the staircase, enters the studio through its vast glass roof, senses the privacy of the bedrooms, stops at the little bay windows in the bathrooms, lingers over the expansive dimensions of a hospitable dining room and inspects the unpretentious entrance hall at its ease (…) High chimney stacks to draw the smoke from the fireplaces (…), sturdy downpipes (…) protective awnings, protru- ding balconies, wooden consoles to break up the rigidity of the stone, (…);enamelled stoneware of lavish brilliance (…);harmoniously tinted woodwork; soberly designed wrought iron (...);everything in its place, everything there for a reason, nothing to add and nothing to subtract”. The entire elevation is an interplay of repeated oppositions: the austere nu- dity of the Euville stone against the polychrome of bricks, stoneware, wood- work and ironwork; the assertive height of the staircase tower against the elliptical arch of the terrace; the medieval inspiration of the flying buttress (which is no longer there) against the Japanese-style woodwork balcony… Inside, the areas dedicated to service, reception and daily life are laid out smoothly and ratio- nally. The decoration, emphasised by the constant presence of wood, acts as a common thread of the interior layout and a link to the exterior. a wide range Sauvage took care of the fixed decoration, which included the ironwork, and called in other artists of talent used for for specific tasks. His Parisian friends, the cera- THe decoration mic artist Alexandre Bigot and the painter Fran- cis Jourdain, respectively created the flambé stoneware exteriors and interiors and the decora- tive paintings in the dining room. Unsurprisingly, Louis Majorelle designed the furniture, some of which was already to be found in his sales catalogues. Nancy’s master glazier, Jacques Gruber, was given the task of designing the stai- ned-glass windows in the main rooms (stairwell, dining room, living room and the Majorelles’ bedroom). The con- crete structural works were carried out by the construction company France-Lanord et Bichaton. The finished ensemble shows the occasional error, such as the north exposure of the terrace, the reusing of materials and money-saving choices, but above all Villa Majorelle stands out as a unique experimental work. Henri Sauvage said later:“I worked there for two years, redesigning my work a hundred times over… I offer this, my first client, this fine artist (…) the expression of my heartfelt gratitude for the unheard-of freedom that he gave me. Despite my young age, he never imposed a budget limitation nor his personal ideas on me.” 5 tHe renoVation of Villa Majorelle 2016–2022 froM Villa Jika After Louis Majorelle’s death in 1926, his only son, the painter Jacques Majorelle, who lived in TO Villa Majorelle Morocco, decided to sell the house. It was bought by the government and housed a variety of admi- nistrative services until 2017.While the surroun- ding land was subdivided, the house itself underwent very few changes over this period, the most visible being the construction of a semi-underground bunker on the south side. Fortunately, none of the existing decoration was lost after the purchase. The gradual rediscovery of Art Nouveau heritage led to Villa Majorelle being listed as a Historic Monument in 1975 then classified in 1996. Nancy City Council has owned the house since 2003. Since 2007, guided tours have been offered at weekends,